Dec 18, 2020
But What I Really Want pg126
Colorful companion to my memoir The Incompetent Psychic
Tyler, Charley and I planned a ski trip to southern Utah, and we left when they shut down the spotlights after the finale of the midnight show.
Around Moapa Charley proffered a tiny box, and explained it was rare and precious Owsley acid from the 60s. It was so good that Tyler and Charley had saved the last of it for ten years, waiting for a special occasion. They figured this was it.
We pulled up to the lodge a few hours later and looked at each other. Still nothing. Charley doled out the rest of the small blotter. We got our tickets and suited up when the first batch hit all at once. We looked in each other’s wide eyeballs and started laughing. From then on the day kept getting funnier and funnier — but only to us. — From Chapter 6
Hallucinogens are a risky trip to the vast unknown, but that’s the point. Lsd or magic mushrooms can offer the trip of a lifetime — but only if conditions are ideal, you are traveling with friends you trust and one’s passport is in order. This particular magical day was like a private jet zipping past fear to an idyllic destination. My brain saw what it was capable of experiencing, imagining and learning when real life doesn’t get in the way. In my youth I did get to pilot the hallucinogenic private jet a few times without crashing, which I credit to luck and divine intervention.
In comparison, our travels through everyday life are more like riding the bus towards the thing we have to do next. Fortunately it is possible to experience enlightenment on that crowded, smelly crosstown bus… but it involves patient practice and sober meditation. Having glimpsed how much energy and expansion the mind is capable of makes it possible for me to believe that jolting bus can take us all to any enlightened place we can imagine — even while standing on it and hanging onto a safety bar. It just takes a lot longer.
A signed copy of Mernie’s memoir is available at www.etsy.com/listing/839838936
Unsigned copies can be ordered wherever books are sold.
